MY GREATEST CHALLENGE MANAGE ACCELERATING PACE OF CHRYSLER’S TALENT ACQUISITION
I
It's official: The auto industry is hiring again. Gone are the days when drastic job cuts whipped through the Detroit area like a strong wind. Gone, too, is the daily drumbeat of plant closings, mass lay- offs, and loss of American market share that became so familiar the last three years. With two of every three Big Three jobs in the United States projected to be located in Michigan, there's a push to attract new talent.
At Chrysler Group LLC, the third-largest U.S.-based automaker, Lisa Wicker had to add 1,000 engineering jobs last year to help the company sell two million cars and trucks a year — a reported 25 percent improvement over the 1.6 million the company sold in 2010. Chrysler has recruited about 600 engineers and continues to hire. But Wicker, a human resources execu- tive, knows a thing or two about challenges that can stymie even the best-laid hiring plans.
Lisa Wicker Chrysler Group LLC
As director of talent acquisition solutions as well as the head of global diversity and compliance, Wicker is front and center of figuring how to leverage Chrysler Group's technology and its name.
In 2003, Wicker told Women of Color magazine's sister publication how recruiting and retaining the 'best-in-class' people was getting tougher as workforce rules change. With the average employee working for eight to 10 employers during a career, compared with four to five a decade ago, Wicker observed that money alone no longer can buy outstanding performance, employee loyalty and retention.
“The new worker has a sense of excitement about the 12 WOMENOFCOLOR | SPRING 2011
technology that is avail- able today, and they want to use it,” she said. “Smart companies understand and provide those oppor- tunities.”
Chrysler Group's new tech- nology includes knowl- edge-based engineering which vastly improves ve- hicle development. Since 2009, customers have benefited from innovations like in-vehicle wireless Internet connectivity, a system warning drivers of approaching traffic in the parking lot aisle during back-up maneuvers, blind- spot monitoring, rear-seat swivel screens, and an enhanced voice-activated in-vehicle communications system.
“[G]reat business progress
is being made due to outstanding products and a grow- ing, engaged work force," Wicker said.
Even with substantial progress, Wicker concedes, her challenge as Chrysler Group lead for Talent and Diversity, is to ensure and caution against becoming complacent. "Our future for talent and diversity must build upon the foundation of the progress we’ve made."
She joined the former Daimler Chrysler in 2001 as a human resources executive. Since then, she has held posi- tions of progressive responsibility to include director, Glo- bal Diversity Office, where she was responsible for design, development and deployment of Chrysler’s corporate diversity strategies, and director of talent management, leadership development & training, Global Diversity, Chrysler Group LLC.
In addition to her current responsibilities, Wicker heads Chrysler Group's EEO Compliance and Governance and Work/Life Effectiveness Policies and Programs depart-
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